Richard Cousins had overseen a six-fold increase in Compass’s share price and planned to retire later this yearPA

Richard Cousins will be remembered in the annals of British business for stepping into the top job at Compass Group, a sprawling, debt-saddled caterer, and transforming it into one of the country’s most successful blue chip companies, making a fortune for investors along the way.

However, the episode that perhaps best sums up his style came before he arrived at the world’s largest caterer. In 2005 he was in charge of BPB, a plasterboard maker, which found itself at the centre of a hostile takeover attempt by a French rival.

His French counterpart accused the BPB management of making exaggerated claims about the company’s prospects as an independent company. Mr Cousins was vexed. “That goes to the heart of the integrity of the BPB board”,…

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